


Stylistic Integrity

by Anarchyinplasma



Series: Semblances: A study [5]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Gen, This old series again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-29
Packaged: 2018-06-05 04:04:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6688447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anarchyinplasma/pseuds/Anarchyinplasma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neo may be an assassin, but she likes to think she lends the occupation a certain je ne sais quoi.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stylistic Integrity

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ikol_Ichigorath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ikol_Ichigorath/gifts).



> Well ikol inspired me again, sorry I didn't use your exact line mate, but I'm holding on to it.
> 
> Dedicated also to a very good friend of mine. Hopefully it'll get him through exams and such a bit easier.

First and foremost, Neo is an assassin. Sure she can run patrol with Roman, stroll around and look dangerous for Cinder, but she is an assassin above everything else. It's an art form to pull off a kill, her semblance was practically tailor-made for the occupation after all.

It doesn't hurt, affecting a personal disguise, there's a pleasant tingle as the illusion subtly rewrites the layer of reality she chooses, it'll fool any scanner, any type of detection, it's why she's good at what she does.

Neo will fully admit that she can't take hits. It's really not her style, but when she does get drawn into a protracted fight (usually when she takes a hit on a hunter or huntress, or that one time with the old Atlesian general) she can still rely on misdirection, it's the one thing she does better than anyone else, and it's fun to beat someone who is so confident they often try stopping to chat (she's no idea why, it makes it so easy for her to put her blade between their ribs).

As she gets older, style becomes more her thing, she sings a little ditty in her head as she plans out a kill.  
“Oh I could throw you in the lake  
Or feed you poisoned birthday cake”  
She'd swear she heard it somewhere before…

When she enters a fight, she'll do a backwards cartwheel or two, land cross legged on a box with nary but a smirk and an innocent expression, that one always gets to people and it gets to be so much fun.

The other side of her semblance is the bigger illusions, they start out as just disappearing when they get hit, having served their purpose, but as Neo refines her style, starts to experiment, gets more ostentatious, they shatter into pretty patterns, like twisted mirrors, she quite likes that, decides to keep it.

Cinder hiring her is odd, the choice had come down to Neo and some nameless idiot, Neo had been assigned as protection while Cinder ordered the other to attempt to kill her as she spent a night at the opera.

Cinder didn't think much of Neo’s approach at first, when she joined her in the opera, scowling at the hitwoman for her lackadaisical attitude. Halfway through the final act a shot fires, there's the shattering of a mirror, and the hitman falls from his spot in the rafters to land in the middle of the spotlights, having killed himself with his own bullet. In the midst of the chaos Cinder turns to her right then and there and purrs at her  
“I think I'll keep you.”  
Neo just smiles angelically at her new boss.


End file.
